Methods for the determination, especially typification and status check of well or fully differentiated mammal cells are required especially in the field of transplantation medicine. For example, it is possible to produce replacement tissue by taking intact cells of the suitable tissue type from the recipient, cultivating them in vitro and re-introducing them into the patient after the necessary cell count has been reached. This can be effected either in the form of solutions or cultivated tissue portions or by cultivating the cells on a matrix (which preferably may be absorbed biologically) and re-implanting them together with the matrix. For example, suitable methods, matrices and cultivation media are described in the German applications 101 62 205.8, 101 62 960.5, 102 20 358.7, 102 22 896.5 and the literature cited therein.
Cultivation in vitro requires on the one hand that only the desired cell types are cultivated from any tissue biopsates obtained from the patient and, on the other hand, that only this cell type are transplanted into the patient. To achieve this, strict control of the preparation from the starting material, of the cell culture and of the finished cell product to be transplanted is necessary. An essential problem encountered both in the recovery of the biopsates and in culture management is the fact that cells in a tissue are not present in their pure form, but in the form of a mixture of different cell types. In addition to chondrocytes or cartilage cells, cartilage, for example, contains fibroblasts which are also found in most of the other tissues. Fibroblasts constitute an undesirable contamination of cell cultures insofar, as they usually grow faster than the desirable specific, well or fully differentiated cells. As a result, they can form the majority of the cells in the cultures after a very short time so that this culture no longer corresponds to the desired tissue type.
Until now, control of the transplants required the determination, especially typification and quantification, of the cells of this culture as well as the starting material and the finished product by means of morphological, histological and genetic methods (PCR). In addition to demanding substantial experience and knowledge on the part of the examiner, however, such determinations are very time-consuming and require sophisticated apparatuses to carry out the different tests. It would be desirable to have a simple method which, if possible, can be run automatically for the typification, optionally quantification and status check of the cells to be transplanted which permits rapid, routine and reliable determination.